Title

Authors

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title/Conference

HortScience

Volume

42

Issue

3

Publication Date

6-1-2007

First Page

555

Last Page

558

Abstract

Precocious varieties of highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum L.) may overcrop during the first few seasons in the fruiting field, adversely affecting plant establishment. Reducing or preventing bloom in the nursery and during establishment would be beneficial in preventing early cropping and reducing the risk of infection by pollenborne viruses. We investigated the efficacy of foliar applications of GA4+7 for suppressing flower bud initiation in blueberry. One-year-old rooted cuttings of ‘Bluecrop’ were obtained from a commercial nursery and established in 11-L pots at the Philip E. Marucci Blueberry and Cranberry Research Center, Chatsworth, N.J. Three separate experiments were conducted over three seasons with ‘Bluecrop’ (and ‘Duke’ in 2005) highbush blueberry where foliar applications of GA4+7 were made at concentrations ranging from 50 to 400 mg·L−1 a.i., with timing treatments ranging from 7 July to 15 Sept., with 10 replicate plants per treatment. Floral and vegetative buds were counted the following spring. In the first study, the greatest degree of flower bud suppression resulted from applications at 400 mg·L−1 repeated weekly from 7 July to 1 Sept. However, these treatments also reduced total vegetative bud number and plant height. In the two subsequent studies, the largest treatment effect resulted from three weekly applications in late August and early September, where flower bud numbers were suppressed by 70% to 85% for ‘Bluecrop’ and 95% for ‘Duke’ while total vegetative growth was unaffected.